When the planets were properly aligned, they attempted the procedure.
The goal was simple: to extract the core from the centre of the sphere.
They had been calculating the precise modulation of their weapons for days,
and they knew the procedure was delicate: their target was a tricky little
thing, with a peculiar spot in the cosmos that made it very sensitive. Any
irregularities, including the energy discharge they were about to inflict
on it, could have unpredictable results. They had checked and rechecked
their calculations, but science can be a difficult thing. Of course, they
had no way of knowing that in another time, in another place, on another
day when the planets were aligned just so, someone else would try a similar
conjuring act. And they had no way of knowing that magic can be just as
tricky as science. Their sphere was a planet. And in that other time and
place…well, it was just a charmed little trinket. But things are seldom as
they seem, in this world or any other. And it is universally known that the
longer one plans for something, the more likely it is that it will go
wrong.

Cordelia held the orb of Zanyxx at arm's length as Wesley sprinkled
the purple powder over it carefully.

"Are you sure you're ready?" he asked.

She nodded. "I've been ready for days, Wesley. If I practice any
more, my head will explode."

"But you understand how sensitive this ritual is. You'll need to hold
the orb at precisely the right alignment for the duration of the ritual, or
the consequences can be…"

"Unpredictable, I know. Wes, I'm good with yoga stuff. I can hold
poses."

"This is hardly yoga!" he huffed. "And I don't think I need to tell
you that if we fail in the ritual, if we misdirect the spirit of Zanyxx, we
won't have another chance to conjure his energy and vanquish the Grfik
demon. AND there would also be the unpredictable consequences to deal
with."

She rolled her eyes.

"All right," sighed Wesley, grabbing a scroll off the table. "Let's
do it."

He began the procedure. Somewhere else, sometime else, someone else
began to do a procedure too. The planets were aligned just so.

The chanting reached its climax, and Cordelia held the orb in
delicate balance. His intonation was perfect. Her hand never faltered.
Somewhere else, sometime else, someone else carefully executed the well-
thought out calculations that guided the energy stream they were directing
at their planet-sized orb. The target shimmered. The energy pulsed outward
in a glowing halo of symbiosis. And sometime else, the chanting ended. The
smaller, hand-held orb glowed too. Its energy pulsed outward in ever-
widening circles, but she held her grip. As the orb's core glowed yellow
with the finality of completion, the light reached a blinding crescendo, so
powerful that at first, they didn't see the small vortex hovering above
them, and the woman that tumbled out of it, stunned.

They rubbed their eyes and rose to their feet, Wesley grabbing the
orb anxiously.

"Did it work?" asked Cordelia.

Wesley turned it over in his hands. "I think so. It is glowing. But…I
don't know. The energy coming from it was…Oh, what's this?"

It was hard to get a good look at her: the small, blond woman
crouched on the floor seemed as dazed as they were. When she finally lifted
a groggy head, they were relived to note that she seemed uninjured. But…why
was she here? The orb was supposed to conjure the energy of Zanyxx, not the
being itself…and in the few writings Wesley had seen on Zanyxx, there was
no mention of the odd-looking…jewelry…that this woman had attached to her
face…

"Are you…quite alright?" he asked tentatively.

"That depends," she said bluntly. "On who you are and what you've
done to me. Where is my ship?"

"Your…what?"

She sighed. "This must be the unpredictable consequences they warned
me about," she muttered. Then, to them: "I wish to see your commander at
once!"

"Umm, he's sleeping," said Cordelia. "But he'll be down soon. We have
some work to do," she said, motioning at the orb.

"That will have to wait. There are matters we must attend to. Such as
locating my ship. You will assist me."

"Geez, bossy much? Look, you just landed in OUR hotel. WE call the
shots!"

The woman gave them a curious stare. "Yes, I did just land in
your…hotel. And yet you do not seem perturbed. What are you?"

"I am Cordelia, and this is Wesley. We work here. And you are…"

"Seven of Nine."

Wesley and Cordelia exchanged a glance. "Nine what?" asked Wesley.

"Seven of Nine. That is my designation."

Cordelia nodded. "We understand that. But…nine what? And where did
you come from?"

Her brow furrowed in thought. "Well, I was on my ship, Voyager. We
were trying to extract deuterium from the planet."

"Deuterium?" said Cordelia.

"Planet?" said Wesley.

She sighed, growing impatient. "The fourth planet of the Zanyxx
cluster. It was a delicate procedure. I was warned there could be
unpredictable consequences…"

"Zanyxx…" muttered Wesley. "Our spells must have gotten crossed."

"Spells?" asked the woman suspiciously. "I don't understand. Zanyxx
is a cluster of planets. We were trying to extract deuterium from it."

Wesley shrugged. "All right, to you it's a planet. To me, it's the
name of a mytho-historical god. We were conjuring his energy to vanquish a
Grfik demon."

"Wesley…" warned Cordelia.

"Oh, come on. It's no stranger than what SHE is telling us!"

"All right, where's Angel? Guest or not, we have a demon to
vanquish!"

"So let me get this straight," said Angel. "She fell from a vortex
that appeared during your spell?"

"Well, more like AFTER our spell."

"And she says she came from where?"

"A space ship of some kind. Voyager, she called it. Angel, I've never
heard of anything like this before. We were summoning the energy of the god
Zanyxx, and she was…summoning energy from the planet Zanyxx…the signals
must have gotten crossed somehow. She said the work they were doing was
delicate, and that the planet was temporally unstable…"

"Temporally?"

Wesley squirmed. "Yes. That was the other thing I had to tell you.
She's…well, she's a bit ahead of us, I'm afraid. 3 centuries ahead, to be
precise."

They were interrupted by a shriek from the lobby. Wesley and Angel
hurried out to find their guest watching impassively as Cordelia pitched on
the floor.

"I did nothing," Seven insisted.

"I see that," said Wesley sharply as he rushed to check on Cordelia.

Then, more gently: "It's all right, this happens a lot. Just give it a
minute…"

He held Cordelia's hand as the vision ran its course. "Cordy? What have we
got?"

She ran a hand through her hair, then strolled over to the desk. "You
hungry? We have doughnuts…"

"I am fine. There is no time for eating, we have work to do."

"Work?"

"I need to contact my ship. They will be looking for me."

"Well, that's great that they're looking for you, because I certainly have
no idea how we can find them."

"You don't? Then why did they leave YOU here?"

"Probably because the choices were either to leave the strange
unpredictable woman here alone, get her killed by taking her demon hunting
with them, or leave someone here to baby-sit. Angel had to go because he
fights demons. Wesley had to go because he knows demons…"

"And you?"

"I'm vision girl. The powers tell me where to send them, and I pass the
message along."

"That's it?"

"Well, I do other stuff too," she said defensively. "Make coffee, do
filing, answer the phone…But don't worry, if anyone can get you
to…wherever…it's Wesley."

"My ship will be looking for me," repeated Seven.

"Uh….sure. Ok. Do you want some coffee?"

"They have technology far more advanced than yours. They will be looking."

"Right," said Cordelia doubtfully. "Your spaceship is looking for you."

"Starship," corrected Seven. "And I find it strange that you just sent your
boss and his "magic" orb to kill a demon that you saw in a vision, yet you
have trouble believing that I live on a starship."

Cordelia shrugged. "Touché. So…you want to play cards or something?"

Angel and Wesley returned half an hour later.

"Well?" Cordelia jumped up eagerly. "How did it go?"

"Perfectly," said Angel. "The orb took care of him quick enough."

"And that means," said Wesley. "That our spell worked. If it had gone
awry, we wouldn't have had the spirit of Zanyxx in the orb."

"Which means?"

"That whatever error in calculation occurred to bring Seven here
happened at her end of whatever they were doing."

"But we can reverse it?"

"I'm afraid not. Their end messed it up. So only their end can undo
it."

"You can have my room, and I'll take the couch," said Cordelia
graciously. They had offered Seven a choice of a room at the hotel or a
room at Cordelia's, and she had chosen Cordelia. She had spent enough time
with the girl to judge her harmless enough. And the Prime Directive was
clear: she should keep a low profile, stay out of the way, and try not to
interfere here. The less contact she had with the fewest people, the
better.

"You believe your living quarters are haunted by the spirit of a dead
human? That is superstition!"

"No actually, it's the truth. His name is Dennis. You'll like him."

Seven sighed. Captain Janeway had told her many stories about Earth
and its superstitions. She could accept that this girl had empathic powers;
that was a known and perfectly quantifiable biological phenomenon, albeit
rarely seen in humans. And that the girl thought it was something magical,
some link to a god-like being…well, Captain Janeway had explained religion
and although she found it odd, she could not begrudge a belief in those
fables, especially because this primitive world didn't seem to offer any
sounder explanations. And demons…well, to a girl this young and innocent,
that could mean any number of things. But a ghost? THAT was just
superstition.

They passed their time surprisingly normally considering the
circumstances. Once Seven realized that she was just going to have to bide
her time, she resolved to wait out Voyager's rescue as comfortably as she
could. And once Cordelia realized that even if Seven wanted to tell her
about the future (which she quite emphatically didn't seem to) their
visitor didn't know the right kinds of information anyway. Nothing about
shopping of the future, clothing of the future…nothing about Earth even.
She must lead a very dull and sheltered life, thought Cordelia. It must be
so boring!

She came to the office with Cordelia and spent most of her time
exploring the computer. It was quaint, a relic, primitive: it fascinated
her. She resolved to save her replicator credits when she got back and make
one of her own. But when would she get back? She had tried explaining to
the wise one with the glasses just what she had been doing when the
accident occurred, but he converted everything into superstition and missed
the point entirely. About the only part they could agree on was that the
temporal instability of the moon Voyager was working on probably was
probably what had gotten their "spells" mixed up.

She had her communicator set on a repeating distress call, and two
days after her mysterious arrival, it bleeped back at her. Within moments,
Captain Janeway had materialized outside the door of the Hyperion and
walked inside.

"Seven?"

"Captain!"

To Wesley and Cordelia, she explained "This is Captain Janeway.
Captain, this is Wesley and Cordelia."

"Pleasure to meet you," said the captain. "Seven, are you alright?"

"Yes, Captain. I have much to tell you. How did you…"

"Temporal signature. Transwarp conduit with just enough juice to get
us back. This is an unusual building," she commented, glancing around her
with fascination.

"They are unusual people," muttered Seven.

With perfect timing, Angel strolled into the lobby just in time to
catch Cordelia as she stumbled backward with a moan. Janeway raised a
critical eyebrow.